Ex-SA Communist Party Leader Chris Hani’s Killer Granted Parole

Janusz Valus, the man who shot anti-apartheid activist Chris Hani in cold blood outside Johannesburg on 10 April 1993 and was sentenced to life in jail, has been granted parole.

A judge in Gauteng North High Court said that Valus must be released within 14 days. The Department of Justice last year resisted Valus’ parole application, saying he showed no remorse, according to news reports.

One of the most popular leaders of the anti-apartheid movement after Nelson Mandela, Hani was also leader of the South African Communist Party. He was shot outside his home in Boksburg as he went to fetch the morning papers.

Valus and his co-conspirator, Clive Derby-Lewis, were both sentenced to death, but the sentences were commuted to life imprisonment. Derby-Lewis was given medical parole in mid-2015.

The SACP said in a statement it was “gravely disappointed and appalled” at the judgment.

“During the proceedings at the Court on 2 March‚ Judge Nicoline Janse Van Nieuwenhuizen made biased remarks suggesting that it was time to forget and move on and that the murderer must be treated with compassion‚ as if his killing of Hani was compassionate,” the SACP said.